Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
Rick Arthur plans to retire from CHRB post next year
Rick Arthur, who as California’s equine medical director has been at the forefront of numerous policy changes for more than a decade, is retiring in the next year.
Arthur, 71, said Thursday that he had planned to retire on June 30, at the end of the 2019-2020 fiscal year, but that the coronavirus pandemic has delayed interviews for his replacement. Now, Arthur said he is postponing retirement to June 2021.
Arthur, a former practicing veterinarian, has been in the position of equine medical director since 2006 through the University of California-Davis School of Veterinary Medicine and is assigned on a full-time basis to the California Horse Racing Board.
Thursday, Arthur said the interview process for a replacement is being conducted by UC-Davis officials. He did not have a timeline on when a replacement would be named.
“They have an intensive process,” Arthur said. “There are good candidates out there.”
Arthur has had an influential role in changing racing board policy regarding medications. Among a few high-profile cases, Arthur was extensively involved in the development of a rule reducing the medications horses can be administered after entries are taken, a policy that took place earlier this year, and developing a lengthy withdrawal period for horses given steroids.
Earlier this year, he published an extensive report on a series of equine fatalities at Santa Anita in early 2019 that made international news.
Arthur cited a continuing education program for trainers and the administration of Lasix by third-party veterinarians as two other recent projects launched under his direction. At times, the changes have been controversial within the sport.
Arthur said it hasn’t been easy to make some of those changes.
“Obviously, there are a lot of things that are difficult,” he said. “It takes so much time. You have to be patient and the horse racing board is a political entity. They go in different directions at different times. Sometimes things are easy to get done and sometimes they aren’t.”
Arthur worked at California tracks as a private veterinarian from 1976 to 2006. When he does vacate his current position, Arthur said he plans to remain involved in the sport to a lesser degree, including participation in research projects.
“I’ll stay involved in horse racing,” he said. “I enjoy some of the international work I do and I expect to continue to do that.”
Other goals have been curtailed by the pandemic, which has forced changes in the way racing is conducted in California, notably the absence of ontrack spectators since
March.
“I was going to travel,” he said. “It’s an odd situation for everybody.
“It’s very frustrating for the owners and the fans. I think we’re lucky to be running.”
Title not main goal for Prat
In the 10 race meetings at Del Mar from 2015 to 2019, Flavien Prat won or tied for first place at the summer meeting three times and won the riding title at the autumn meeting once. He finished second at four meetings.
Prat, 27, is expected to have an equally strong performance at this summer’s Del Mar meet, although the number of days he will be riding at other venues might affect where he ends up in the standings.
Sunday, Prat is booked to ride eight of the 10 races in his second appearance of the meeting. He was booked to ride Friday’s opening day and scheduled to ride at Keeneland on Saturday.
Later this summer, Prat is likely to ride at Churchill Downs when the track runs the postponed Kentucky Oaks on Sept. 4 and the Kentucky Derby on Sept. 5. Prat won the 2019 Kentucky Derby on Country House, who was promoted from second to first after Maximum Security was disqualified from first for causing interference.
This year, Prat said the riding title at Del Mar may be secondary to winning big stakes.
“This is not the main goal, but it is one of them,” Prat said of the riding title. “We’re going to try. I’m going to go out of town maybe a few weekends.
“Hopefully, we can have a good meeting. The main goal is to find a good 2-year-old.”
Oddly, jockeys are also seeking good 3-year-olds at this time of year for the rescheduled Kentucky Derby. Prat rides the unbeaten Cezanne, who has yet to run in a stakes but could do so in the $100,000 Shared Belief Stakes at Del Mar on Aug. 1. The race is part of the Kentucky Derby qualifying series.
“I think right now it is wide open,” Prat said of the Kentucky Derby. “The Derby will be different anyway.”
In the last five years, a rider has needed 35 to 42 wins to secure the riding title at a Del Mar summer meeting. This year, the total could be slightly less, with 28 days of racing compared to 36 in 2019.
Prat was the leading rider at the six-month Santa Anita winter-spring meeting, which ended on June 21, with 90 wins, 29 more than runner-up Abel Cedillo.
At Del Mar, Prat will contend for the riding title against Drayden Van Dyke, the leading rider at the 2018 summer meeting and runner-up last year, as well as Cedillo and perhaps Juan Hernandez, who recently relocated from Northern California.